Anilrgowda

EW YORK
The business-segment debut of Microsoft Corp.'s Vista operating system was less impressive than the launch of Windows XP five years earlier, but made more of a splash than most industry watchers expected, according to a research group.
In December, Vista's first full month on the market, businesses spent nearly 4 percent less acquiring licenses to upgrade their operating systems than they did when Windows XP hit the shelves in November 2001, according to NPD Group.
And even though Vista will soon replace XP as the default operating system sold with personal computers, XP still outsold Vista in terms of new copies of enterprise licenses in December.
But NPD Group analyst Chris Swenson said Vista trailed by a narrower gap than expected -- especially given that Microsoft's main marketing push, which will coincide with the consumer launch of Vista at the end of January, is still weeks away. XP, on the other hand, launched its consumer and business versions -- and its major marketing campaign -- all at once.
Some software-industry watchers expected businesses to adopt Vista slowly, believing that IT departments would upgrade only when they replaced aging hardware.
"I don't think the data confirm their negative predictions," Swenson said.
The analyst noted that medium and large-sized companies bought more Vista volume licenses than small businesses did. Swenson said he would have expected the opposite: Cash-strapped small companies would buy inexpensive software upgrades and outfit their existing computers to run Vista, while larger businesses with deep pockets would spend more up front on faster computers that come with the new OS.
The slightly higher ratio of big businesses buying Vista licenses in December "says that the large enterprises are actually very interested in this technology," Swenson said.
Shares of Microsoft gained $1.04, or 3.5 percent, to close at $30.70 on the Nasdaq, after hitting a 52-week high of $30.75 earlier in the day.